Blog | The Ancient Egypt Heritage and Archeology Fund

01FebFebruary 1, 2023

Deir el-Ballas 2023, Week 4: 1/21-1/26 and 1/28-1/30

We finished up this season by completing our on-site documentation, which was followed by back-filling our excavated trenches with sand and laying mud bricks on top of the exposed walls to protect them for the next season. We are also continuing to make new mud bricks for the future as they require several months to properly dry before they can be used. (Fig. 1). Fig. 1 Making new bricks for use in the restorations (photograph by Nicholas R. Brown). Most of what...

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22JanJanuary 22, 2023

Deir el-Ballas 2023, Week 3: 1/14-1/19

This week, excavation work continued at the site as we further explored House E and House F, as well as the North Wadi Settlement. We were joined this week by Sara Ahmed Aziz, who was a great help to us with work in the North Wadi Settlement excavations as well as the on-site magazine and workroom. Ana Oliveira Asuncion started to finish up work in the House F grid extension to the north. Much to our surprise, her excavation...

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15JanJanuary 15, 2023

Deir el-Ballas 2023, Week 2: 1/6-1/12

This week we were joined by two Egyptology students from the American University In Cairo; Victoria Shakespeare and Ana Oliveira Asuncion have already done an amazing job. Ana has taken over the work in House F, clearing an extension north of the house in order to discover if there are any further architectural remains or evidence of home-industry activity. Victoria opened new ground in an area of structures to the north of the North Palace and North Settlement. So far,...

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14JanJanuary 14, 2023

Deir el-Ballas 2023, Week 1: 1/3-1/5

The Deir el-Ballas Expedition started up work again on January 3 with a large, international crew. This season and are concentrating our efforts on the northern part of the site now that the restoration work on the “South Palace” is largely complete. This season we are continuing our archaeological survey of a group of houses in the North Settlement along with the Late Antique period remains on site, as well as continuing to study ceramic and botanical remains from previous...

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17FebFebruary 17, 2022

Deir el-Ballas 2022, Week 6: 2/12- 2/13

Our last days on site were occupied with finishing the recording, registration, and storage of finds from the season, taking final photographs and measurements on-site, packing up the excavation equipment, and backfilling Houses E and F in the North Suburb. An important part of the Expedition's excavation work includes backfilling and reburying our trenches when the season is over. The reasons for this are to help protect the archaeological features of the trench, such as the mudbrick walls and mud...

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17FebFebruary 17, 2022

Deir el-Ballas 2022, Week 5: 2/5- 2/10

In our final week of excavation, Nicholas Brown finished his excavations of House E covering Room 4, the W2 "Corridor", Room 5, and Rooms S1-S3 (the ancillary spaces south of the textile workshop). The work at the North Suburb not only includes discovering domestic artifacts and collecting samples for future research (such as botanicals or pottery sherds), but it also demands that we properly record and document our work and what we found. Piet Collet, the Expedition's surveyor, spent time...

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10FebFebruary 10, 2022

Deir el-Ballas, 2022 Week 4: 1/28 – 2/3

Excavations continued in the North Suburb, with Nicholas Brown and Hassan Elzawy in House E, concentrating on Room 5 (the Textile Workshop) and Room 4, an unexplored area of House E. Work progressed nicely in both rooms, and we are learning more about the architectural elements of these two rooms along with gaining a better understanding of what life was like in this house during the Second Intermediate Period. For instance, in Room 5, two square mud-brick hearth installations were...

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02FebFebruary 2, 2022

Deir el-Ballas, 2022 Week 3: 1/22 – 1/27

At the end of Week 3, we are now halfway through our excavation season for 2022. Alhumdu-lilah our excavation work and conservation efforts at the site are progressing quite nicely and we are enjoying our work with our Egyptian colleagues from Qena and our local Egyptian teammates from Luxor and Ad-Deir Al-Gharbi. In the North Suburb, Nicholas Brown continued his work at House E. This week, work focused on the excavation of Room W2- a room tentatively identified as a “corridor”...

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25JanJanuary 25, 2022

Deir el-Ballas 2022, Week 2: 1/15-1/20

Work is progressing nicely at Deir el-Ballas, as we continue our conservation and excavation efforts at the site. This week we were joined by two more expedition members, Sara Ahmed Abdelaziz and Hassan Elzawy, who are working with the team at the North Palace and North Suburb. At the South Palace, the restoration work is almost complete. We are finishing the stairway inner wall and next will cover the stairs with a protective layer of mesh, sand, and mud. We...

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14JanJanuary 14, 2022

Deir el-Ballas 2022, Week 1: 1/6-1/13

Finishing up restoration on the façade of the “South Palace” This marks our first week back at the site. We are continuing the restoration on the “South Palace” and have finished the façade and are now capping the inner stairway wall preparatory to restoring the stairway next week. During the cleaning to cap the wall, we discovered more wood fragments embedded in the mud-brick on. The same line as those found earlier. One was another cedar fragment that had been painted...

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